Cross-sectional study of rapid tapering of opioid prescriptions following medical regulatory intervention in Alberta from 2013 to 2020

OBJECTIVE: To determine if inappropriate tapering/discontinuation of opioids to Alberta patients occurred from mid-2013–2020, as unintended consequences of prescribing guidelines, regulations and policies in response to the North American opioid crisis. DESIGN: A population-based, repeated cross-sectional time-series study. SETTING: Alberta, Canada. PARTICIPANTS: Residents of Alberta, Canada aged 18 and older who received an opioid dispense from a community pharmacy from 2013 to 2020. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: The prevalence of potential rapid tapering was measured at a given date (reference day), enveloped by a data window. Dose changes were measured as oral morphine equivalents (OME) per patient, at multiple time points (‘data window’ around a reference day). Chronic recipients were identified, and their prescriptions were contrasted 90 days before and after the reference day to measure OME/day changes. RESULTS: Approximately 9000 dispenses (totalling ~6 million OME) per day were analysed from 2013 to 2020. The total number of opioid recipients was highly cyclic in nature (peaking in winter). The number of chronic opioid recipients remained somewhat stable from ~70K in 2013 to ~86K at the end of 2020. The number of chronic high and very high dose recipients presented a significant decrease after 2017. Approximately 11%–12% of chronic high-dose recipients experienced potential rapid dose tapering at a rate of 50% or more prereference to postreference day at any given point of time. For chronic very high dose recipients, approximately 11.5% experience potential rapid dose tapering at a rate of 50% or more prereference to postreference day at any given point of time. Potential discontinuation remained constant and the interventions did not have a significant impact on the trend. CONCLUSION: The evidence suggests that changes in prescribing guidelines were not associated with an increase of rapid opioid tapering/discontinuation in Alberta.